Answer the Hard Questions!

I was playing electronic solitaire mahjong tonight.  The house was quiet with no sound really other than the clicking of the mouse and the quiet whir of the desk fan.  While strategizing on how on what tiles to play together and when I found myself reflecting on the assessment I took yesterday.  I was playing back what Scott Schwefel said about the assessment basically asks you the same question 25 times to get at an accurate reflection of the unconscious and conscious self.  By asking the same question in various ways, it is able to get to the core of how you see yourself even when you don't know you are looking.  It's probably the reason I'm still looking for the hidden cameras!

One of the hats that I wear at FIVE STAR is that I'm responsible for collecting information on new speakers and keep updated information on the speakers in which we have an established relationship.  My mind then reflected on the Speaker Profile that we ask all the speakers we work with to complete.  It's based on the questions we get from our customers when they are looking for speakers for their event.

There is one question that is on the profile that I consider one of the most important questions when evaluating new speaker, but I have found over the years must be one of the hardest to answer.  So hard than only half of the people who complete the profile even answer the question.  The question is "Speakers I am similar to."  For speakers who we don't know and are sending this to us blind, outside of what topics they speak on and the background, it's probably the most important question.

It's important on several levels.  First being, it gives us the expectation of what the person may deliver to the client.  Especially if they are comparing themselves to someone we've seen. If the question is answered honestly, it can help with starting a momentum with the agents.  Secondly, many times we have clients wanting a speaker that is outside their budget but one someone similar that is in their budget.  This helps us in determining what speakers to consider recommending to the client.

Now back  the other half that don't answer this question.  Part of this group attempt to answer the question with an non-answer.  "No one, I'm completely unique" or "there's no one like me out there."  I say these are non-answers because it's avoiding the truth.  While we all think we are unique, there's always SOMEONE that you are like even a little bit.  In the 5 years that I have asked this question, I have yet to find anyone that said this that I couldn't compare them to in either delivery style, topic category or content.

I realize there is the main reason that this question get skipped or completed with a non-answer, fear.  Fear that we will propose that speaker instead or worse with of them and the client will book the other speaker instead.  While I won't deny that could happen, the real reason behind the question is to help get them proposed more! 

What I also 'see' when it's not answered is that this speaker hasn't done their competitive analysis.  In this industry speakers are always competing with another speaker somewhere. Depending on the topic, they could be competing with several hundred speakers.

My mind jumped to this while thinking of the assessment is that it always in the back of my mind on how to ask this question differently in order to get answer the question.  I don't have the answer, but I would hate to add 25 more questions to the the already 8 page profile!

If you actually read this whole thing, the essence of this blog post is . . . if you are hit with a hard question, use it as an opportunity to reflect on yourself and don't skip it or give a non-answer.  You could be short changing yourself and blocking the success for which you are aiming!